Professor Mark J. Kushner Named the George I. Haddad
Professor of
Engineering

Prof. Mark J. Kushner has been
named the George I. Haddad Collegiate Professor of Electrical Engineering
and Computer Science. This
professorship is given in recognition of Prof. Kushner’s sustained
excellence in research, teaching, and service throughout his career. Prof.
Kushner will deliver a public lecture Thursday, April 9, 2009.

An
international leader in his field, Professor Kushner is the inaugural
Director of the Michigan Institute for Plasma Science and Engineering (MIPSE).
His research in low temperature plasma science and engineering addresses
fundamental transport and reaction chemistry of partially ionized gases and
their application to technology. He is also head of the Computational Plasma
Science and Engineering Group (CPSEG), which develops computer simulations
of low temperature plasmas and technologically important devices which use
low temperature plasmas. Some of the recent areas of emphasis are lasers,
microelectronics fabrication, multi-phase plasmas, polymer treatments and
biocompatible materials.

Prof. Kushner received a B.A. in astronomy and a B.S. in nuclear
engineering from UCLA, and M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in applied physics from
the California Institute of Technology. He served on the technical staffs of
Sandia National Laboratory and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory before
joining Spectra Technology, where he was director of electron, atomic and
molecular physics. In 1986, Kushner moved to the University of Illinois at
Urbana-Champaign where he was the Founder Professor of Engineering in the
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. His administrative roles
included Assistant Dean of Academic Programs and Associate Dean for
Administrative Affairs in the College of Engineering, Interim Head of the
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, and Interim Head of the
Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering. Most recently he was
Dean of Engineering and the Melsa Professor of Engineering at Iowa State
University.

He has published more than 230 journal articles, made more than 350
contributed presentations and delivered more than 200 invited conference
talks and seminars on topics related to plasma materials processing, lasers,
lighting sources and pulse power plasmas. He is Editor-in-Chief of Plasma
Sources Science and Technology. Kushner has received numerous honors and
awards, including the Semiconductor Research Corporation Technical
Excellence Award, the Tegal Thinker Award for Plasma Etch Technology, the
AVS Plasma Science and Technology Award, the IEEE Plasma Science and
Applications Award, and the Semiconductor Industry Association University
Researcher Award.. He is a Fellow of the American Physical Society, IEEE,
the Optical Society of America, the American Vacuum Society, International
Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry, and the Institute of Physics.

George I. Haddad

This named professorship is in honor of George I. Haddad (BSE MSE PhD,
Electrical Engineering, '56, '58, '63), the Robert J. Hiller Professor
Emeritus of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science.

Prof. Haddad
holds a unique position among the EECS faculty. He came to the University as
an undergraduate student in 1952, graduated with his PhD, was hired as an
Assistant Professor, and served as Department Chair for 19 years. He also
served as Director of the Solid-State Electronics Laboratory, was Director
of the Center for High-Frequency Microelectronics, and PI for the ARO-MURI
Program on Low Power/Low Noise Electronics.

Professor Haddad was instrumental in establishing the Department of
Electrical Engineering and Computer Science in 1984 from the existing
departments of Electrical and Computer Engineering, for which he served as
Chair, the Department of Computer and Communication Sciences, and the
graduate program in Computer Information and Control Engineering.

He has
graduated 58 PhD students, many of whom have continued his legacy of
education and research excellence combined with an abiding concern for
others. His early research spanned masers, parametric amplifiers, detectors,
and electron-beam devices, and later turned to microwave and millimeter-wave
solid-state devices and monolithic integrated circuits, microwave-optical
interactions and optoelectronic devices, and integrated circuits. Though
recently retired, he remains active in Departmental and College affairs.